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“It wouldn’t be a real marriage, Jacob. Alex says we’d be married in name only.”
“Are you sure about that? I mean, he says that now…”
“What do you mean? If Alex says—”
“He’s lying to you, Taylor. Once you’re married to Jean-Paul, you will be expected to be his wife in all sense of the word.”
I felt a chill trickle down my spine.
“Alex wouldn’t expect that.”
“He does. He told Victoria that you’d have to learn to be more accommodating to your husband once you were married, whether you liked it or not.”
I frowned. Jacob was wrong. Alex wouldn’t lie to me.
Jacob looked hesitant. “I know what he makes you do.”
My eyes darted to his, and his sudden revelation caused my words to snag in my throat. “You do?”
He nodded. “You don’t have to do it, Taylor. He has no right to make you.”
“How long have you known?”
“Not until recently. I saw you once—”
“Forget what you saw. Promise me, Jacob.” Fear licked at my skin like a hot flame. If Alex knew, he’d kill him. “I don’t want you to talk about it.”
“You have a choice. You don’t have to do that for him—”
“You don’t understand.”
“He forces you to—”
“Please don’t say anymore!”
A wall of unspoken words went up between us.
He knew. And I hated that he knew.
Because now that he knew what I let Alex do to me, he would look at me differently.
The silence between us stretched on for what seemed like eternity.
Then, Jacob chuckled. “We’ve been best friends for the past three years, and that’s the first awkward silence we’ve ever had.”
My laugh was half-hearted. “I suppose so.”
“You know what this calls for?”
“No, what?”
He launched at me. Tickling me until we were both rolling on the ground and I was laughing so hard I thought I might pee.
It was Alex’s voice breaking into the afternoon air that stopped us. I looked up. He stood across the lawn from us, his dark eyes narrowed, the sleeves of his crisp white shirt rolled up to the elbows.
“You two need to follow me.” His voice was as sharp as a knife’s edge.
I looked at Jacob and saw the humor leave his face. I didn’t know Alex was home. Didn’t hear his car. I thought he was still out of town on business.
Not that we had anything to worry about. Alex discouraged me from being friendly with Jacob, but he wouldn’t lose his shit over us hanging out. He knew there was nothing between us. In the three years Jacob had been working here, Alex knew we had grown as close as brother and sister.
But something in his voice sent a chill down my spine.
Jacob rose to his feet and helped me to mine. Buying time, I dusted the grass off my legs, then followed him toward the house.
Alex beckoned us over to the pool house.
Jacob and I gave each other a confused look.
Because Alex never went to the pool house…ever.
Something wasn’t right.
And it became very apparent when we stepped inside and found Victoria tied to a chair, with two goons standing on each side of her, and Jean-Paul looking cold and intimidating by the window. My eyes shot back to Victoria who was struggling against the ties binding her hands to the chair, the swelling around one of her eyes telling the tale of her last ten minutes with Alex.
Jacob stiffened next to me, his hands fisted at his side. Before he could react, one of the goons grabbed his arms and twisted them behind his back, before shoving him across the room. He pushed Jacob onto another chair and held him there by aiming a gun at him.
Victoria started to cry.
“Alex…?” I looked at my godfather in alarm. Fear prickled at the base of my spine. “What are you doing?”
“What I should’ve done weeks ago when I found out my gardener was tending more than just the rose bushes. He was tending her bush as well.”
Oh hell.
Alex knew about Jacob and Victoria.
His furious gaze locked to mine.
“But I waited to see what you would do. Waited to see where your loyalties lay. I assumed they would keep it from you to begin with, but I knew you were too smart not to figure it out.” His black eyes narrowed. “Weeks passed. And nothing. No word from my goddaughter about the gardener and her stepmother. So, that begs the question, did you know?”
Our eyes locked. And I summoned all my strength from everything I had learned from him. I raised my chin, just slightly, but enough to let him know that I wasn’t afraid of him.
“Did you know your friend the gardener was fucking my wife?”
“Yes,” I said.
Alex prided himself on keeping a poker face. But his mask slipped momentarily, and I saw the darkness there.
But it wasn’t disappointment.
It wasn’t anger.
It was psychopathic rage.
He struck me across the face, and the force whipped my head to the side. But it didn’t knock me down. Instead, it activated my own rage and an innate instinct for survival. I stalked toward him, but the sound of the goon cocking his pistol at Jacob stopped me.
